@tightwad Almost did that, then remembered my car doesn’t even have an aux port. I used to have a cassette-to-aux device, but now the cassette player doesn’t even work, so I bring Bluetooth speakers in my car. It’s getting ridiculous, but so close to debt-free, I’m not about to fix it.

@simplersimon@tightwad A similar solution, if the car is your intended use case, would be to get a Bluetooth-to-FM transmitter… It receives your Bluetooth audio from your phone (or other device), and then passes it into a low power FM radio signal on a frequency of your choosing. I got one of these for my mum, whose car has a CD/radio, but lacked either a cassette, aux, or other input, and now she has her version of “Apple CarPlay” … Audio quality is surprisingly decent, given the Bluetooth compression, plus the short range FM radio transmission. Not the most elegant thing, I’ll admit, but it plugs into the 12V socket so it doesn’t require battery or any extra cords at all, although you could wire in a local source via an aux-in on that adapter too.

If you find a plug to plug adapter (or aux cable), you might be able to turn an appropriate stereo into a Bluetooth device. One of my favorite cheap products was a Bluetooth 30-pin Apple adapter so all those fancy docks were suddenly less useless.

@f00l according to the manual, not separate but they do have those controls. Vol up/down have their own buttons, next/prev are accomplished by holding down those buttons. Power, play/pause, and answering a call are taken care of by the third button.

I use an Anker Roav B2 in my shop to connect to an old stereo, and a Besign BK02 in my car, chosen for its wiring configuration to be able to have the puck/mic on the dash but connect to the power and aux connection at the rear of the center console. Both work well.

So I don’t know why I’m tempted by these, except cheap. And self-powered. And I bet I can make up uses for more.

Mine arrived today. It took a minute or two for the red charging light to illuminate from when I first plugged them in. They’re still charging. I’m going to use one to send audio from my phone to the line-in of a non-Bluetooth stereo.
I wonder if I can charge it and use it at the same time. You almost need a magnifying glass to read the included instructions, not that I would read them.
/giphy rtfm

I’m thinking about replacing the internal battery (shown below) with a connection to a USB charger so I can use the device without ever having to charge it. My concern is that I will have to re-pair the thing with my phone every time I turn the power off. I think a big enough capacitor with a resistor across the power leads might be enough to prevent total power loss to the circuit.

Alternatively, I’m thinking about replacing the internal battery with an old car battery. It could theoretically power the device until it fails.
/image old car battery

Just so you know, from their web site:ZipKord branded products covered by this “Limited Lifetime Warranty” are warranted to the original owner against manufacturing defects in materials and workmanship for the lifetime of the product… “Lifetime” of the product means the product’s useful life, which is 3 years from date of purchase, or when the product is discontinued by ZipKord, whichever comes first.

So they apparently expect these to last about 3 years, unless they are in the habit of discontinuing their products sooner. OTOH, sending them back under warranty would probably cost more than Meh’s per item price here. I.e, just buy extras. (Meh, you didn’t get us discontinued goods, did you?)

FWIW, that the manual is actually in fairly perfect English, not chinglish, might be a good sign

@djslack I was looking at a nice hose from goodyear at Home Depot the other day and couldn’t find details about their length of warranty on the box. They just mentioned “During the warranty period.”

But what I did find interesting is what you need to do to claim the warranty. You need a copy of your original receipt (no problem), cut off both ends of the hose and mail that in (shipping might cost more than the hose), plus the UPC code off the packaging. Who keeps the packaging of a hose? If a connector falls off 3 years from now, you think I’ll have that UPC code around the house? They are out of their minds.

Sometimes Sams Club has these cheap knife demonstrations that come with a lifetime warranty. But when you read the specifics on the warranty, it says to mail the knife back with something like $25 for each knife for return shipping and handling. The entire box of knives cost about that much so who, in their right mind, would pay for shipping a knife back and $25 to have a replacement shipped back to you? This is a total scam and shouldn’t be allowed.

@cengland0@djslack Those SAMs Club shitty knife demos are good for one thing… standing at the demo whilst catching up with email on your phone… so you can grab the cheap paring knife they give away at the end.

The paring knives are not great but they are still handy and no worry knives for trimming strawberries.

@WootTangClan Except there’d be no “push-to-talk” on that setup. It’d be a full-duplex conversation. I suppose if you’ve already got cameras without audio in the house, that setup could possibly be a jury rigged baby monitor.

I don’t understand why 33-40 feet of freedom is such a big thing. Yeah, you can go to the bathroom in your own house while listening to music. Oh ,I’m sorry, I forgot, we now take our phones to bathroom habitually. Our phone are an essential means of social exchange.

@rtjhnstn For headphones it means I can leave my phone/iPod in my pocket or bag while I’m walking around or move around at my desk without getting tangled. I have a wireless adapter like this for my car so I can put mu phone on a dash mount without stretching a long aux cord across the front of my car.

@djslack I figured I did something wrong. I thought I would get a response telling me I was asking the impossible if it was wrong though. I would have been surprised on delivery if I had not checked the order. I plan to have one charge while using one for two people.

There’s a third category of people who would buy this. People like me, who sweat so much during exercise that even “sweat-proof” bluetooth earbuds are lucky to last three months. Jacked earbuds are usually good for a year or two, making this device a money-saver.

I have just joined my true calling to Mediocrehood, without even knowing it. So, I guess I have truly found myself.
I have used bluetooth devices like this for years. Mostly to listen to podcast. Just using one earphone so I can still be aware of what’s happening around me. Usually these devices have cost as much as the three of these if not more [ since these are voice recordings and not music, the audio quality doesn’t have to be great ( though I do have a tin ear ). I started using bluetooth devices when I buggered up my headphone jack on my phone and it was the best alterative. Also I like not having a electromagnetic device not next to my head for extended periods.
Thank you for allowing me into the Mediocrehood. I will cherish it.

Gonna give it a go to try and turn my audio jack into Bluetooth in the car. Tried one of those lightning to audio jack converter cables and it did not work, so 3 for $9 is worth the gamble plus Christmas presents for the fam if it works.

This is classic Meh mentality, That being me, I order them immediately, 30 seconds later i’m ready to cancel the order wtf am i’m gonna do with these? Then the hey their only 3 bucks and i may be able to re-purpose these kicks in,I keep the order, soon to be in the Meh draw where i have at least 50 items i don’t use but were to cheap to pass up, funny thing is this week a found an unopened Meh purchase from July 23rd 2015 paid 18 bucks for it, It’s the Go Groove BlueSYNK SPB and it’s an awesome product, Bluetooth speaker/receiver FM radio and a power bank The FM radio gets a lot of stations unlike some crummy Fm radios out there, so there yah go. That’s why I buy this crap because every now and an again you get a gem.

@ccooper I bought 3, needed 1. Could spare a second but the morning save deal would be a better buy I think. For the record the one I bought works great…thinking about using another for airplane trips with a short aux cable. I love my wireless earbuds.

For those wondering, the BT/Charging LED is under the middle button. And it takes a fair bit to light up on first charge. Or at least mine did. They sound pretty good when paired with a set of IEMs (Massdrop x Nuforce EDC).

I used it as a way to add Bluetooth to a car with an Aux input but no BT. Works very well, pairs easily with my phone. My only complaint, and it’s not fair to the product, is that it can’t detect when the car is shut off. I forgot about that and my audio book kept playing until I got out of BT range. The voice that indicates the one/off-ness is actually pleasant and the sound is good.

Really happy with these so far. Was prepared for them to sound awful, but they don’t. They’re also smaller than I expected (which is good!), and they even have a little clip on the back to hold onto clothing. Initially thought they were all DOA since no lights came on with 2 different chargers. Later tried again with a power bank that’s designed to look like the bottom of a sneaker (thanks Meh!) and the light finally came on after a little while.

My only real complaint is that it doesn’t seem like these can be used while charging, unless someone can correct me on that? Still, 6 of these for $18 is a great deal. The only comparable item I previously owned cost $15 for just 1. (though it has way better range/battery life/quickcharging/etc…

@lemonswithsalt I’m really happy with them so far too. Like you, I was prepared for disappointment, but the sound is great, and I love being able to use any of my headphones, earbuds, etc. without having to worry about cables.

Anyone else get shorted one? I opened up one only to find it had only the cable and not the…plug unit, whatever you wanna call the main piece. The other two had them. Maybe I’m dumb and somehow flung it onto the floor while opening it and haven’t found it yet (quite possible), but it seems like I got shorted one. Which isn’t exactly a huge deal when you order 3 for under 10 bucks, but I thought I’d mention it just in case anyone else was having issues.